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developer and enterprise administrator for a large financial institution in Atlanta, Georgia. Part of my job is supporting the large complex document captures systems that I help build. Due to the importance of these systems I am expected to be reachable 24/7/365. That is good for job security, but can be bad for my family life. I have four beautiful children and I strive to be a true “hands-on” dad who is present in my family’s daily lives. So armed with your book and a fresh (ocean air) perspective, I set out to put many of the 4HWW principles into practice. First, I worked on changing my e-mail habits. I took a hard look at my inbox and used several of the techniques outlined in the 4HWW to eliminate all the waste and noise. I formed new habits around batching my e-mail sessions and it didn’t take long to achieve a zero inbox using the “trusted trio” folder method. I also applied the less is more philosophy to composing my e-mails. I went to great lengths to ensure I am as clear and concise as possible. Only communicating exactly what is needed to the right audience and not to the world. By eliminating all the noise and fat from my e-mail diet it became much 90 more clear what “actions” or “to-do’s” were important. Meetings and conference calls were the next area of attack. I scrutinized each meeting invite and began declining requests left and right. Most of the time I would claim I had too much going on to attend. I started asking for the minutes of the meeting or for someone to IM me if they had a specific question I needed to answer. When I do attend a meeting it is almost always via a conference call. Due to conference room restrictions and geographic challenges in our company most of our meetings are done virtually anyway. Less wasted time meant more time to focus on work and tasks that really mattered. I felt like I was doing less but getting more things done and with better results. The right people were starting to notice and the perception of my ability to get the job done had never been better. I was making my management look good, and when that happens they stop asking questions or micromanaging daily activities. I kept proving to them I can do it without interference. Now was the time to make the push for what I really wanted and that was to go virtual! Going virtual was actually very easy. I had a solid foundation with my manager and others in the chain of command. Almost all of my daily work was already remote-ready. At home, I have a great dedicated office in our finished basement. It is situated well away from the rest of the house and is mostly free of distractions. I have my own bathroom with shower and I even have a mini-fridge and microwave. I dare say that my home office rivals the amenities of the top executives at my company. Most of all, I have a wife and family that totally understand and respect the rules I set for myself to continue this success. At first, I worked one or two days a week from home, but it didn’t take long before I found myself working four out of five days a week from home. When the Southeast was hit by the gas shortage and the price of gas nationwide was cresting $4 a gallon, the company made working from home even more accepted and official. I became an overnight model for others to follow. As people around me were in a panic as to how to get to work when no gas could be found, I was happily working away at home just business as usual. At this point, things were working better than I ever expected. Using my 4HWW skills I now had more time to be that hands-on dad I wanted to be. I became a regular up at the elementary school. I eat lunch in the cafeteria with my girls, especially on fried chicken day! I participate in a program called D.E.A.R. which stands for Drop Everything and Read, where a few times a month I come in and read to each class. I drive my kids to school and I get to see them when they come home. For my entire family, I am present in their everyday lives, and can’t put a price on that. I felt like I had achieved my goal. That was that. So I thought... Other things started to happen. Without conscientiously knowing it, people around me at the school or church had a weird respect for me. I say weird because people literally mistook me as a doctor or just some sort of self-made millionaire. I am not kidding. There is this one guy who still calls me “Doc.” I guess the reason for this is because most people still cling to the old stereotypes of what they think it is HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_014028